The personal blog of Peter Lee a.k.a. "China Hand"... Life is a comedy to those who think, a tragedy to those who feel, and an open book to those who read. You are welcome to contact China Matters at the address chinamatters --a-- prlee.org or follow me on twitter @chinahand.

Friday, September 16, 2016

Ill Omen for Asia: America’s North Korea Nuclear Conundrum

I consider North Korea to be America’s stalking horse for
its China strategy.

Seoul has already developed a plan to “annihilate” Pyongyang in a
massive bombing campaign if the North shows signs of a nuclear attack, the
Yonhap news agency quoted an unidentified South Korean military source as
saying Sunday.

The plan, known as “Korea Massive Punishment & Retaliation” (KMPR),
was revealed after the Defense Ministry briefed the National Assembly last week
on the subject, Yonhap said.

Using colorful language reminiscent of North Korean state media, the
report said that Pyongyang would be “reduced to ashes and removed from the map”
if signs of an imminent attack were uncovered.

“Every Pyongyang district, particularly where the North Korean
leadership is possibly hidden, will be completely destroyed by ballistic missiles
and high-explosive shells as soon as the North shows any signs of using a
nuclear weapon,” the report quoted a source as saying.

“The KMPR is the utmost operation
concept the military can have in the absence of its own nuclear
weapons,” the source added.

With this level of violence being proposed as the new
baseline, and South Korea’s anxieties about its non-nukishness reaching new
heights, it’s not surprising that the US has to raise the ante with the threat
of a tactical nuclear strike to maintain credibility as South Korea’s protector.

With “nuclear capable” B-52s over the Korean peninsula to
show our resolve, nukes are back in Asia (as
I predicted back in April: backpat for China Hand!), President Obama’s
dream of salvaging his Nobel Prize for non-proliferation by renouncing first
strike is in tatters and…

And…

…and in case you’ve noticed, the conventional US deterrent
is apparently unable to bring to North Korea, a battered and sanctioned state
with an economy the size of Ethiopia’s, to heel.

What’s that say about the credibility of the US deterrent in Asia?

Not good things.Believe me.

First off, the temptation for Japan and South Korea to go
nuclear is getting stronger.

That means in order to forestall the proliferation of
nuclear weapons among our allies in Asia and the concomitant erosion of the US
leadership position, the US has to adopt more aggressive measures to claim the
initiative in North Asian security and pre-empt the Japanese/ROK nuclear option.

The most logical but most destructive endgame for keeping US
on top is for it to forcibly de-nuclearize North Korea, either by
lighting off WWIII with an invasion or trying to force the PRC into doing it
for us.

Good Luck With That.

In my piece, I make under-appreciated point that the PRC is
just as worried as anybody else that North Korea will drop a nuke on it in retaliation
for regime-change shenanigans, so I’m not expecting anything particularly
aggressive from China along the lines of forcible counter-proliferation.

Not a lot of really attractive options, in other words.

The implications for U.S. PRC policy of a failure of the North Korea deterrence are not particularly heartening. If perceptions of the effectiveness of the US military and the efficacy of US leadership continue to erode, the US will have to get more aggressive in its security strategy to retain the initiative in Asia, and not just the Korean Peninsula.

If trends continue, it seems to me the US will have to compensate for its decreasing military advantage by migrating from a relatively stabilizing military deterrent/containment strategy
to a more aggressive, results-oriented China-collapse strategy to convince Asia it's got the chops to stop the PRC pandadragon in its tracks before it's too late.

How aggressively the US deals with the strategic challenge of nuclear North Korea will be a useful harbinger of its intentions for the PRC.

3 comments:

It would appear that the US is backed into a number of corners. The middle/near east doesn't look any better lately. Add also the joy of the tail wagging the dog- or the money wagging(waging) the mercenary. All the while trying to maintain (im)plausible deniability for domestic consumption. Whack a mole on the cheap for private profit and public plunder. So what blows first? East or west Asia